Lebara revenue doubles in one year

Lebara Mobile has almost doubled its revenue over the last 12 months, fuelled by continued customer acquisition since its launch in October 2007, Mobiletoday can exclusively reveal.

The company would not reveal exact group revenue figures, but it is up 98% from the previous year, and its customer base has improved by 82%.

The UK business accounts for over one million customers, making it a critically important territory for the MVNO, which specialises in providing cheap, overseas calls.

COO Tim Wort told Mobiletoday: ‘We’re not just moving products and services around. This is genuinely increasing customers and building a profitable business.’

Wort couldn’t comment on the exact amount of revenue due to commercial sensitivity, but added: ‘This is substantial growth by any metric.’

The company said it has a total base of three million customers across the Nordics, Spain, the UK and the recently launched Australian business.

CEO, and one of the three founders, Yoganathan Ratheesan, said the UK business benefited from continued interest in Lebara’s proposition from the millions of UK residents with family in a vast range of different countries.

The company is looking to build on its current growth by looking to other regions with a high density of ethnic minorities and migrant workers, with Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds and Glasgow the initial destinations.

It is also looking to grow its base by offering free Lebara-to-Lebara calls and texts, hoping the proposition will have a viral effect in adding new customers.

However, the company ruled out radical changes such as postpay or subsidised handset bundles.

Ratheesan said: ‘Our growth is pretty strong in the current format. We want to support that growth for the coming year.’